AMA Superbike Previews Laguna Seca

Hot off the heals of an exciting weekend at Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course, the AMA Pro National Guard SuperBike series will once again take to the track for the Red Bull U.S. Grand Prix weekend at Mazda Raceway Laguna Seca, July 23-25.

The battle for this year’s championship is up for grabs but two riders in particular laid claim to the title at last weekend’s Mid-Ohio race.

Team Graves Yamaha rider Josh Hayes posted his fourth win of the 2010 season with a flawless performance in Saturday’s race.

But his main championship rival, Tommy Hayden came right back on Sunday with a very determined ride on his Rockstar Makita Suzuki for his third National Guard SuperBike win of the season.

Hayden fought back from what was a ten point deficit after Saturday to just a four point difference going into the Sunday, July 25th SuperBike race right after the MotoGP race.

Joining these two in the chase for the championship are National Guard Jordan Suzuki rider Jake Zemke, who won the two opening races this year at Daytona under the watchful eyes of team owner Michael Jordan.

Zemke’s teammate Aaron Yates continues to recover from an early season injury but his replacement rider, Canadian Brett McCormick, ran a great race at Mid-Ohio on Sunday and passed his teammate on the very last lap for fifth.

Right behind Zemke in the points is Larry Pegram and his fan favorite Foremost Insurance Ducati. Pegram, in his local race at Mid-Ohio, posted a fourth place finish Saturday and went one better Sunday with third place. Pegram also won earlier this year at Auto Club Speedway.

Pegram was able to beat Ben Bostrom on Sunday after Bostrom had taken third on Saturday. Bostrom has quietly worked his way right back into the thick of things with his Pat Clark Motorsports team Yamaha.

Another rider returning to action at last week’s Mid-Ohio round and again at Laguna Seca is Eric Bostrom aboard the Cycle World Attack Performance Yoshimura Suzuki.

This continues the trend that saw Canadian SuperBike Champion Jordan Szoke take part in the Mid-Ohio round of the AMA Pro series and he has expressed his interest in running fulltime in the AMA Pro National Guard series in 2011.

In another interesting twist, all three Hayden brothers will be racing this weekend at Laguna Seca, Nicky and Roger Lee in the MotoGP and Tommy in the National Guard SuperBIke race.

These riders and the many other regular National Guard SuperBike competitors will be competing as twenty-eight entries have been received for the July 23-25 Red Bull U.S. Grand Prix MotoGP event weekend.

Better yet, the field will be competing for the Double Purse for this race too. Practice and qualifying will begin on Friday, July 23 and the National Guard SuperBike race will be Sunday, July 25. Don’t miss all the SuperBike action from Laguna Seca on SPEED TV, July 26 at 1:00 AM.